Saint Joseph Catholic Church

In his latest weekly address, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church said that Ukrainians are celebrating the Christmas season, “although the circumstances in which they celebrate it are becoming increasingly dire.”

Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk added, “By celebrating Christmas, Ukraine finds the Savior, who was born among us today, incarnated; who became a Ukrainian soldier defending the homeland; a refugee who left his home; a volunteer helping all those in need; a rescuer extinguishing fires; and a medic who saves human lives.”

Pope Leo XIV received pilgrims from the Parish of Santo Tomás de Villanueva in Alcalá de Henares, Spain, and spoke to them about the parish’s patron saint.

St. Thomas of Villanova (or Villanueva) was an “Augustinian religious who was open to God’s action in his life, and whose readiness led him to do much good for the Church and society of his time,” Pope Leo said during the audience, which took place yesterday in Consistory Hall of the Apostolic Palace.

The Pontiff—like St. Thomas of Villanova, a member of the Order of Saint Augustine—spoke about the saint’s continuous prayer, industriousness, and love for the poor.

Speaking with Vatican News, the president of the episcopal conference in the strife-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo welcomed Pope Leo’s repeated calls for a “disarmed and disarming peace.”

Archbishop Fulgence Muteba of Lubumbashi also welcomed the continuity between Laudato Si’, Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical on care for our common home, and the teaching of the current pope. The Congolese prelate said, “The future of the world depends on safeguarding the environment and combating the destruction of everything around us.”

Vatican News, the news agency of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication, summarized Archbishop Muteba’s comments in its English-language report; it also posted the video of the interview, which was conducted in French.

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Seventeen Catholic missionary workers were killed in 2025, the Fides news service reports in an annual year-end account.

Since the start of the 21st century, Fides reports, 626 missionary workers have been killed. That figure includes priests, religious, seminarians, and lay catechists.

Nigeria accounted for five of the missionaries slain in 2025. Two were killed in Haiti and two in Burkina Faso. Others died in Kenya, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Mexico, the US, Myanmar, the Philippines, and Poland.

Africa saw the largest number of missionary killings, with ten. The Americas—treated by Vatican statistics as a single continent—followed with four.

Puerto Rico’s Governor Jenniffer Gonzalez-Colon has signed into law a bill that gives unborn children full legal rights.

The new law reads: “Every human being is a natural person, including the conceived child at any stage of gestation within the mother’s womb.”

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